Amazon and India: Actions and Languages
In technology, as in life, actions speak louder than words. And if you look at the actions Amazon has been taking over the past 18 months, it’s clear that Amazon …
John Yunker
Duolingo adds Arabic (and its flag strategy begins to fall apart)
Duolingo is an impressive language-learning app. I can’t say I’ve become fluent on any of the languages offered but I certainly enjoy sampling them. And now you can sample Arabic. …
The tragic irony of Amazon vs. Amazon
Imagine if a Brazilian technology company created an online store called Appalachia. And, over the years, Appalachia.com grew to become a global giant, so much so that the company pursued …
New report illustrates how country codes enable diversity in languages on the internet
Thanks to a heads-up from Ali at CircleID, I discovered a new report by Oxford Information Labs (sponsored by the Council of European National Top-Level Domain Registries. The Council of …
Selected slides from Mary Meeker’s 2019 Internet trends report
I always enjoy skimming through Mary Meeker’s annual survey of global Internet trends (now via Bond Capital). What follows are a few slides that jumped out at me. Let’s begin …
Tesla’s global website shifts into reverse
Tesla was benchmarked in the 2019 Web Globalization Report Card. Of the 16 companies studied, Tesla finished in the lower half (higher scoring than Honda and Subaru, but still with …
WordPress Translation Day recap
Looks like the most recent WordPress Translation Day was a linguistic success. Here are the details from WP Tavern: Events in 35 countries (see map below) 183 new contributors 12 …
Deloitte: The best professional services website of 2019
For the 2019 Web Globalization Report Card, we studied the following professional services websites: Accenture Capgemini Deloitte Ernst & Young Goldman Sachs KPMG PwC For the first year since we …
Cisco Systems: The best enterprise technology website of 2019
For the 2019 Web Globalization Report Card, we studied the following 13 enterprise technology websites: Autodesk Cisco Systems DHL FedEx HP Enterprise Huawei IBM Intel Oracle SAP Texas Instruments UPS …
Got a question? Ask me on May 1st
I’ll be participating on May 1st at 11 am (Chicago time) in a one-hour Weggchat — responding to questions via Twitter. So if you have anything to ask me about …
Forget it Jeff, it’s China
Another one bites the dust in China (Amazon.cn), expanding upon my previous post on the challenges of succeeding in China. Wall Street Journal: Amazon’s E-Commerce Adventure in China Proved Too …
What’s the world’s most multilingual website? (2019 update)
Last year, I wrote an essay for Multilingual in which I noted that the world’s most multilingual website isn’t Google or Facebook or even Wikipedia. It is the website of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. As I noted in …
WordPress Translation Day is coming
Did you know that (US) English accounts for fewer than half of all WordPress interfaces currently in use? As you can see below, courtesy of WordPress, English still technically accounts …
The internet may connect devices, but language connects people.
I had an OpEd published this week in the Los Angeles Times about the importance of languages — and the slow but steady increase in languages supported by the world’s …
World Book Tekom: Speaking in Tongues
I’m pleased to have an essay in the latest Tekom World Book: Speaking in Tongues: What Languages Should Your Website Support? Link